Cheyenne Bride

by Laurie Paige

  “Thanks for the information,” she said.

  The young woman nodded and hurried inside, obviously not anxious to talk. Leanne climbed back into her car.

  She stopped at the Hip Hop Café. There she ordered a cup of coffee and checked the newspaper for ads.

  “Cream?” the waitress asked.

  Leanne looked up from the paper. She stared at the waitress with a sense of déjà vu. Startled, she blinked and studied the young woman, then realized why she seemed so familiar. It was the eyes. And the shape of her mouth. They were similar to the woman’s at the rooming house. The two women could have passed for twins except that the waitress was closer to normal weight. Also, the nose was different. A coincidence, Leanne thought, nothing more.

  She went back to the Want Ads and noticed one for the diner. Brightening, she looked around and saw a Help Wanted sign propped up next to the cash register. The diner was quaint and because she’d been there with Cade, that made it special.

  Romantic thinking, she chided. Get over it.

  She hadn’t worked as a waitress, but it couldn’t be that different from serving a bunch of hungry ranch hands. She asked the waitress if the manager was in.

  An hour later, Leanne left the diner with the job and an apartment. Janie, the manager, rented her the rooms over the diner where the owner used to live. Leanne felt much more confident than when she’d left the ranch.

  She moved her sparse belongings in, then aired the place while she dusted and vacuumed. When evening came, she had a stocked refrigerator, a shining apartment and a bed to sleep in. What more could a person ask for?

  A thousand things came to mind, all of them centered on one cowboy she’d met three weeks ago. She stared at the unfamiliar ceiling and shifted uncomfortably in the strange bed. Life was what it was, she told her grieving heart. She could have dreams, but she had to be practical, too.

  There was a line from a song… What was it?

  Oh, yes. The heart does go on.

  But it hurt.

  Cade joined Serena Dovesong and her son outside the Hip Hop. He’d met her a couple of times through his aunt. Serena was a cousin of a cousin and therefore his cousin, too, per tribal custom.

  “Have lunch with me,” he invited.

  He’d come to town under the excuse of needing worm medicine for the horses. He didn’t fool himself. He wanted to see how Leanne was doing. Yesterday she’d called Rand, then Garrett, and told them about her new job and apartment. But she hadn’t called him.

  It worried him, this need to see for himself that she was okay. Maybe it was a sense of responsibility left over from the fake marriage. He couldn’t figure it out, but the need was gut deep. Hence the trip to town that could have waited another week. And the one last night. And the night before. He grimaced. Sir Galahad, that was him.

  When they entered the diner, the first thing he saw was Leanne, her lower lip caught in her teeth as she cautiously navigated between tables with a heavily loaded tray. He suppressed the worry. If she could lift a bale of hay and pull a foal, which he knew she could, she could handle a dinner tray.

  He and Serena and six-year-old Nate settled at a table next to the front window. “There’s someone new in town,” Serena pointed out.

  He glanced at a young woman coming down the street carrying a shiny, obviously unused shovel. She put it in a car and drove off. “Looks like she’ll be planting flowers for next spring.”

  “I love buttercups and tulips,” Serena said.

  “I helped Mom plant bulbs,” Nate informed him proudly. “Plant bulbs, not light bulbs.” He giggled at his joke.

  He was a cute kid with straight dark hair like Serena’s. Unlike his mom’s dark brown eyes, his were as blue as the summer sky in late afternoon. Deep blue. With thick black lashes. The effect was startling against the boy’s dusky skin. Where those eyes came from was a mystery his mother hadn’t divulged.

  Cade glanced back at the diner. Leanne was coming their way. Instantly he felt a tightening inside as if all his nerves went on alert.

  “Hello,” she said brightly as she set down three glasses of water. “The lunch special is corned beef with cabbage, corn bread and chocolate pudding tart. Shall I get you something to drink while you decide?”

  “Iced tea,” Serena said. “You’re new here, aren’t you?”

  “As of three days ago,” Leanne said with a smile. “I used to work for Simon Legree here, but it was too much.”

  “His name is Cade,” Nate said. “He’s my friend.”

  Cade saw a shadow flick through the green eyes. “He’s a true and loyal friend,” she told the boy sincerely.

  He swallowed hard. He didn’t know why the words meant so much to him. He introduced her to his Native American kin.

  “We’ve missed you at the ranch,” he continued. “Garrett told me to say hi for him when I saw you. The spreadsheet for the breeding program is great. I’ve put in Stepper and Delilah’s lines and added the new colt.”

  She nodded without comment and hurried away when a bell dinged from the kitchen. He watched as she delivered another tray of food, quickly and competently, smiling and quipping with the customers. The ranch hands at the counter joked with her, interest in their eyes.

  He wondered if he was the only one who could see how sad she was. That bothered him. It bothered him a lot.

  The rush hour was over and Leanne was on her lunch break. She quickly ate the special, then took her dishes to the kitchen. Coming out of the restroom a bit later, she paused when she heard a sound like a suppressed sob.

  Peering around the corner, she saw a young woman on the telephone and recognized her as Christina Montgomery, the mayor’s daughter. She was weeping.

  Leanne hung back, reluctant to embarrass the woman in her distress. “I’ve got to see you,” Leanne heard Christina say in a desperate and frightened tone. “I have something to tell you.”

  Sympathy stirred in Leanne. She’d heard the other waitresses speculate on Christina and her problems yesterday when she’d also come in to use the phone. They thought she was pregnant. Overhearing one end of the conversation, Leanne thought she was, too.

  The collective opinion was that Christina’s socially prominent father would be furious when the news could no longer be hidden. For Christina’s and the baby’s sake, Leanne hoped she was safely married before that time came.

  When Christina hung up, she dashed around the corner in tears, her hands covering her face, her haunted eyes peering between her fingers. Leanne pressed against the wall as Christina went into the ladies’ room to cry out her grief.

  Shaken, Leanne went back to work. She wasn’t pregnant, but if she had been, she would have gone directly to Cade. He would never deny his child or fail to take care of the mother. Of that, she was positive.

  She pressed a hand to her heart. She missed him. She missed working with him and worried about him getting the horses ready for the sale at the end of the month, which was almost upon them. She missed sharing things with him—laughing at a new foal’s attempts to stand, worrying about the weather, having dinner with their families.

  Remembering hurt too much.

  “That was Christina Montgomery going down the hall, wasn’t it?” her customer asked when she returned to duty. Kate Randall, the local judge, sat at the table with Winona Cobbs, the local psychic.

  The Hip Hop had a varied clientele, Leanne had learned. Everyone who was of interest or importance in the town and county eventually showed up there.

  “Yes,” she murmured.

  Kate looked worried. “I’ve tried to talk to her,” she said to her companion.

  “She needs help,” Winona agreed. “I get bad vibes every time I’m near her. I’m sure Ellis doesn’t know she’s pregnant.”

  “So, she is pregnant.”

  Winona nodded solemnly. “I don’t know who the father is, but I think he should be told.” She closed her eyes. “Sometimes I can almost see him. I know he’ll help her.”
<
br />   Chill bumps spread down Leanne’s arms and back. She felt very sorry for the mayor’s daughter. “Is there anything else?” she asked after putting their food on the table. “I’ll bring you more tea.”

  “You’re Rand Harding’s sister,” the psychic stated.

  Leanne nodded warily.

  “Give me your hand, child.”

  Leanne shifted the tray to her left and held out her right hand. Winona took it and opened her palm. She dragged her finger down a line through the center, then closed Leanne’s fingers as if she’d pressed some object there.

  “Follow your heart,” she said.

  Startled, Leanne jerked back. The soft blue eyes of the psychic filled with kindness as she observed the reaction.

  “You had the answer in your grasp, but you were afraid. Take your happiness, child. You’ve earned it.”

  “I don’t know what it is, where it is,” she confessed.

  “Your aura is between the sky and the earth. That’s where you should be. It’s where your heart is.”

  Shaken with longing and painful stirrings in her chest, Leanne hurried to answer the call of the bell that told her another order was ready. Winona’s message drummed through her head the rest of her shift and far into the night.

  The sky and the earth.

  She knew where those were. They met on the horizon of the Kincaid ranch. Where Cade was.

  Did the psychic mean she should have accepted his offer of marriage?

  She shook her head. A one-sided love wasn’t enough. She would grow to hate the marriage, herself, him.

  No, it was too big a risk.

  Besides, he’d already found someone else. He was very interested in the Native American side of his heritage, and there had been tenderness in his eyes when he’d looked at Serena Dovesong. Her little boy admired Cade. The three of them had looked like a family, sitting there and chatting while having lunch. They had looked natural together.

  Winona had gotten the vibes wrong where she was concerned.

  Leanne climbed into bed and felt its emptiness all the way to her soul. She contemplated the irony of life: she’d run away from a man she didn’t love and a real marriage only to become involved with a man she did love in a pretend marriage. It was funny, but she couldn’t manage a laugh.

  Gazing at the night sky where the mountains met the stars, she felt the yearning rise full and poignant within her. “Cade,” she murmured, and desperately missed his quiet presence beside her.

  Thirteen

  Cade cursed and shifted with Stepper’s movement under him. “There he is,” he said.

  The rogue stallion stood on a rise of land, watching them come toward him and the string of five females he’d stolen from the ranch during the night. Scenting the wind, the intruder trumpeted a challenge to Stepper, warning the Appaloosa he was in the other stallion’s territory.

  Stepper’s ears pricked forward. He arched his neck and pranced excitedly. Cade wished he’d brought a mare to act as a decoy, but he didn’t have time to build a temporary corral and wait for the mare to attract the thieving stallion. The auction was set for the coming weekend, only a couple of days away. He had to retrieve the stock and get back.

  He worked his way up into the rough country, following the trail laid down by the stallion and mares. He was tempted to let them go, but it wasn’t in his nature to give up what was his without a fight.

  His thoughts flew to Leanne. She wasn’t his, he reminded himself. She had to come to her own decisions about what she wanted. Clearly he wasn’t it.

  Well, he’d done the honorable thing. He’d offered. She was the one who had refused to make their marriage real.

  The challenging trumpet of the wild stallion echoed over his head, startling him out of his musing. Fool, he reprimanded himself. He’d better stay alert.

  Stepper screamed an answer and lunged up the narrow ravine. Cade leaned forward in the saddle and readied the lasso. He was going to tie the stallion up until he drove the mares down to the pasture, then he’d come back and set the rogue free.

  The sound of hoof beats told him the mares were moving, but he couldn’t see them. Following his instincts rather than logic, which told him this was a box canyon, he rode straight toward the end.

  The narrow passage rounded a boulder and opened into a small meadow, where he spotted the mares heading down the creek. He realized he and Stepper had come out between them and the rogue. Lady Luck was on his side for once.

  He turned his mount to follow the mares and push them on down the mountain to the pasture. “Hi-ya,” he yelled like a banshee, stirring the string into a run.

  Behind him, he heard the shriek of the stallion as he realized his band was being taken from him. Pulling up, Cade removed the rifle from the scabbard and pointed it toward the rogue. He fired into the dirt well in front of the stallion, but the horse kept coming at them.

  Stepper neighed in response to another challenge.

  Cade fired a bit closer. The stallion veered to one side, then attacked from that direction. He bore down on them, his ears flat, his neck outstretched.

  Cade changed the angle of the rifle but couldn’t bring himself to shoot the wild creature who was only defending what he considered his. He fired again into the ground.

  The rogue reared up and came at them, hooves flailing, teeth bared. Stepper, raised in captivity, had never fought off another stud. He gamely rose to the challenge.

  Cursing, Cade turned him, aiming to back off and gain room for another shot, this one close enough to graze skin.

  Stepper answered the pull of the reins. Giving great leaps on his hind legs, the other stallion followed. Cade realized the rogue was going to strike. He saw the flash of hooves, then felt the stunning blow to his leg just above the knee. He brought the rifle up, a thin barrier against thirteen hundred pounds of enraged beast. The impact of a head against his shoulder threw him sideways.

  Pain whirled like a red haze through his mind. He felt himself falling and tried to kick free. He landed on the rocky soil with a bone-crunching thump and felt the impact of a rock on the back of his head. He fought off the blackness that threatened to engulf him. His left foot was suspended in the stirrup above him. He had to get it free.

  Stepper stopped as he’d been trained to do under the circumstances. He pivoted to face the intruding stallion.

  Cade realized the Appaloosa was keeping his body between his fallen rider and the wild stallion. When the rogue came close, Stepper laid his ears back and snapped.

  Cade pushed himself up with one hand, grabbed the stirrup with the other and freed his foot. When he tried to stand, he couldn’t.

  His right leg was probably broken where he’d been hit. The left ankle was definitely sprained. He leaned against a boulder and picked up the rifle from the dust.

  Ignoring the pain, he aimed and fired.

  The wild stallion screamed in rage and, whirling, raced off, tail and mane flying like banners, a furrow where the bullet had skimmed along his right flank speeding him along.

  Cade laid the gun carefully aside. He felt the darkness rushing over him as the pain ricocheted down his head and shoulder and joined that from his leg and ankle.

  “Leanne,” he mumbled. “I need you.”

  He didn’t know why he said that.

  Leanne sat at the little table in the apartment and read the newspaper. It was her day off, her first. She finished the news, then idly glanced through the Want Ads. There was one for the Kincaid ranch. “Ranch hand needed. Experienced with horses. Top pay. Contact Rand Harding, Kincaid ranch.”

  She finished the cup of coffee and argued with herself for fifteen minutes before picking up the phone. She rang the ranch office at the bunkhouse. Rand answered.

  “Rand? This is Leanne,” she said quickly. “I saw the ad in the paper for someone to help with the horses. I want to apply for the job.”

  There was a second of silence, then, “Look, Leanne, I can’t talk right now. I’m expe
cting a call.”

  Something in his tone alerted her. “What’s wrong?”

  He hesitated. “We’re getting a search party together. Rafe Rawlings is bringing a team of dogs to track…”

  “Who?” she demanded when he paused again.

  “It’s Cade. He left yesterday morning to round up some mares that got out. He didn’t come in last night. His horse was standing at the stable this morning when Gil got there.”

  “Cade,” she said, her breath coming short and fast. “I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

  “There’s no need—”

  “There’s every need,” she corrected fiercely.

  The line hummed with tension. “Okay. We’ll be heading northwest toward the Crazies. We don’t have time to wait for you. You can catch up.”

  “Right.”

  She hung up, grabbed her hat, a long-sleeved shirt and sunglasses and took off, panic edging closer as she thought of Cade hurt…dying…dead.

  “Hold on,” she prayed over and over. “Hold on, my love. Please. Please, let him hold on.”

  She arrived at the ranch twenty minutes after the search team left. Gina and Suzanne were waiting for her.

  “We have your mount ready,” Suzanne told her, handing the reins over on a chestnut gelding.

  Gina handed her a fanny pack. “Water,” she said. “And food, some first-aid stuff.”

  Leanne strapped it on, checked the cinch and mounted up. “Thanks,” she said, and was off.

  The trail of the rescuers was easy to follow. She picked it up in the high grass beyond the meadow and followed them up the increasingly steep slope. The land became rocky and treacherous. Limestone bluffs jutted at rigid angles toward the sky, hidden arroyos suddenly opened at a turn in the trail.

  She caught sight of Rand, Garrett, the Remmington twins and another man on a rise far ahead of her. When she yelled a hello, they stopped. Rand and Garrett waved, motioned her onward, then the group resumed their tracking behind a couple of mongrel dogs. She rode on.

  Forty minutes later, she wiped the sweat off her face and sat back on her heels. At some point she’d lost the rescue team. Now she’d have to circle back to see if she could pick up their prints again.